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Hezbollah’s Pioneering Role in Suicide Terrorism
Aftermath of the bombing of the US Marine Corps Barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, October 1983. (Photo: Screenshot)
JNS.org – The Israel Defense Forces has recently reassessed its official explanation for a deadly explosion that rocked an administration building used by Israel in southern Lebanon in 1982. In doing so, it cast a spotlight on Hezbollah’s pioneering role in introducing suicide bombing to the Middle East.
A new investigation committee led by Maj.-Gen. (res.) Amir Abulafia, which included members of the Israel Security Agency and the Israel Police, determined “with high probability” that the collapse of the administration building in Tyre on Nov. 11, 1982, was due to a suicide car bombing.
The attack resulted in the deaths of 76 security personnel (from the Border Police, IDF and ISA) and 15 Lebanese detainees. Soon after the attack, Hezbollah claimed responsibility and commemorated it as the death of its “first martyr.”
Ely Karmon, a senior research scholar at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University in Herzliya, pointed out that this conclusion is not a new one.
“Most if not all experts on Hezbollah and suicide bombing considered early on that the bombing was the result of a suicide operation by Hezbollah,” Karmon told JNS.
He noted that a monument near Baalbek, Lebanon, is dedicated to 17-year-old Ahmad Qasir, the bomber responsible for the attack. Hezbollah celebrates the attack annually on November 11 as Martyr Day, with Nasrallah referring to it as the organization’s first.
Nearly a year after that attack, Karmon said, another suicide bombing occurred in Tyre, on Nov. 4, 1983. The bomber drove a pickup truck filled with explosives into an ISA building located at an IDF base, resulting in the deaths of 28 Israelis and 32 Lebanese prisoners, and wounding about 40 others.
These bombings firmly established Hezbollah as a pioneering force in suicide terrorism in the region.
However, Karmon added, the first modern suicide bombing in the Middle East is considered to have occurred on Dec. 15, 1981, in the form of an attack on the Iraqi embassy in Beirut by the Iraqi Shi’ite Islamist group al-Dawa.
The explosion leveled the embassy, killing 61 people and injuring at least 100 others. It was likely the first of five signature bombings organized by Imad Mughniyeh, a Hezbollah terrorist leader, in which a terrorist drive into a building with a bomb-laden truck, Karmon assessed. Mughniyeh was assassinated in a car bomb in Damascus, Syria, in 2008.
“The Lebanese branch of the Iraqi Dawa Party was founded in the 1960s. It would later become a core component in the establishment of the Hezbollah movement in 1982,” Karmon explained.
The use of suicide bombings by Hezbollah was significantly inspired by the tactics employed by Iranian forces during the Iran-Iraq War, according to Karmon.
“The sacrifice and martyrdom of Iranian young or child soldiers” likely influenced the young Hezbollah operatives, he stated. During the Iran-Iraq War, Iranian child soldiers were given plastic “keys to paradise” as symbolic assurances of their passage into heaven upon their deaths. These young soldiers were frequently used to clear minefields by simply walking through them, an act celebrated in Iran as a form of ultimate martyrdom.
Hezbollah’s introduction of suicide bombings set a precedent that was soon emulated by other, Palestinian Sunni terrorist organizations.
Karmon noted that after Israel deported 415 Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives to Lebanon in December 1992, the deportees established a camp near the southern Lebanese village of Marj al-Zuhur, close to the Israeli border. During their stay in southern Lebanon, they were indoctrinated and trained in suicide bombing by Hezbollah operatives. After a year, they were permitted by Israel to travel back Gaza and Judea and Samaria, and began organizing the first suicide bombing atrocities of the 1990s.
The Mehola Junction bombing on April 16, 1993, in Samaria, marked the first suicide car-bombing carried out by Hamas and PIJ terrorists, said Karmon. This was followed by another car bombing by Hamas member Sulayman Zidan on Oct. 4, 1993 at Beit El.
Bassam Abu-Sharif, former PFLP spokesman, claims in his book Tried by Fire that Waddi Haddad, the operational leader of the terror organization at the time, initiated suicide bombings in the early 1970s. One recruit, Abu Harb, was trained to fly a twin-engine plane from the Bekaa Valley to Tel Aviv, with the intent of crashing it into the Shalom Tower. The plan was thwarted when Abu Harb crashed during a practice landing and was severely injured. Published in 1995, Sharif’s book predates the 9/11 attacks by six years.
The spread of suicide bombing tactics was not limited to the Middle East, Karmon told JNS.
In 1983, Sri Lankan Tamil Tiger cadres were training in Hezbollah terror camps at the time of the massive suicide truck bombing of the US Marines in Beirut.
“A few years later, the head of the Tamil Tigers, Prabhakaran, decided to try to model an attack after the Beirut suicide truck assassination,” said Karmon.
In July 1987, the first Tamil Tiger suicide attack occurred when a terrorist drove a truck into a barracks of Sinhalese Sri Lankan troops. This attack initiated a wave of suicide bombings that lasted for over two decades, demonstrating the wide-reaching influence of Hezbollah’s tactics.
“But they are not religious,” said Karmon in reference to the Tamil Tigers. “They’re not Islamic. They’re a Hindu group, a Marxist group. They’re actually anti-religious. They are building the concept of martyrdom around a secular idea of individuals essentially altruistically sacrificing for the good of the local community.” Nevertheless, the Tigers ended up killing a Sri Lankan president with a suicide bombing in 1993.
The Kurdish PKK separatists in Turkey also adopted suicide attacks. The group began using suicide attacks in mid-1996. Most PKK suicide attacks were carried out by women against military or police targets, and the campaign proved to be ineffective.
Meanwhile, Al-Qaeda began to adopt this tactic by the 1990s, and went on to plot and implement the deadliest suicide mass casualty terror attack in history, on Sept. 11, 2001. The hijacking of four passenger aircraft on that dark day occurred 30 years after the PFLP hijacked five passenger planes simultaneously and blew them up in Jordan.
In the years that followed 9/11, Al-Qaeda inspired jihadists would implement suicide terrorism in Iraq, Syria and around the Middle East, as well as in European cities. Islamic State, its successor organization, adopted the tactic as well, employing it in Afghanistan, the Middle East and Africa.
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New Poll: Majority of NYC Voters ‘Less Likely’ to Support Mamdani Over His Refusal to Condemn ‘Globalize the Intifada’
Zohran Mamdani. Photo: Ron Adar / SOPA Images via Reuters Connect
In a warning sign for the campaign of Democratic nominee for mayor of New York Zohran Mamdani, a majority of city voters in a new poll say the candidate’s hardline anti-Israel stance makes them less likely to vote for him.
In the survey of likely city voters conducted by American Pulse, 52.5 percent said Mamdani’s refusal to condemn the slogan “globalize the intifada” coupled with his backing of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement made them less likely to vote for him in November. Just 31% of city voters polled were more likely to support him because of these positions.
At the same time, a significant share of young New York City voters support Mamdani’s anti-Israel positioning, a striking sign of shifting generational views on Israel and the Palestinian cause.
Nearly half of voters aged 18 to 44 (46 percent) said the State Assembly member’s backing for BDS and “refusal to condemn the phrase ‘globalize the intifada’” made them more likely to support him.
Mamdani, a democratic socialist from Queens, has been under fire for defending “globalize the intifada,” a slogan many Jewish groups associate with incitement to violence against Israel and Jews. While critics argue it glorifies terrorism, supporters claim it’s a call for international solidarity with oppressed peoples, especially Palestinians. Mamdani has also voiced support for BDS, a movement widely condemned by mainstream Jewish organizations as antisemitic for singling out Israel.
The generational divide exposed by the poll comes amid a broader political realignment. Younger progressives across the country are increasingly critical of Israeli policies, especially in the wake of the Gaza war, and more receptive to Palestinian activism. But to many Jewish leaders, Mamdani’s rising support is alarming.
Rabbi David Wolpe, visiting scholar at Harvard University, condemned the phrase with a sarcastic analogy.
“‘Globalize the intifada’ is just a political slogan,” he said. “Like ‘The cockroaches must be exterminated’ was just a housing authority slogan in Rwanda.”
Jewish organizations have reported a surge in antisemitic incidents in New York and across the U.S. since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war last fall. The blending of anti-Zionist slogans with calls for “intifada,” historically linked to violent uprisings, has deepened fears among Jewish communities that traditional red lines are being crossed.
Whether this emerging coalition reshapes New York politics remains to be seen. However, the poll indicates that among younger voters, views that were once considered fringe are quickly moving into the mainstream.
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Report: Jews Targeted at June’s Pride Month Events
A Jewish gay pride flag. Photo: Twitter.
The research division of the Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) released a report on Wednesday detailing incidents of hate against Jews which took place last month during demonstrations in celebration of LGBTQ rights and identity.
Incidents reported by the group include:
- At a Pride march in Wales, the activists Cymru Queers for Palestine chose to block the path and show a sign that said “Profiting from genocide,” an attempt to link the event’s sponsors — such as Amazon — to the war in Gaza.
- A Dublin Pride march saw the participation of the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which labeled Israel a “genocidal entity.”
- In Toronto at a late June Pride march, demonstrators again attacked organizers with a sign declaring, “Pride partners with genocide.”
CAM also identified a recurring narrative deployed against Israel by some far-left activists: so-called “pinkwashing,” a term which the Boycott, Divest, Sanctions (BDS) movement calls “an Israeli government propaganda strategy that cynically exploits LGBTQIA+ rights to project a progressive image while concealing Israel’s occupation and apartheid policies oppressing Palestinians.”
The report notes that at a Washington DC Pride event in early June Medea Benjamin, cofounder of activist group Code Pink and a regular of anti-war protests, wore a pair of goofy, oversized sunglasses and a shirt in her signature pink with the phrase “you can’t pinkwash genocide.”
Other incidents CAM recorded showed the injection of anti-Israel sentiment into Pride events.
A musical group canceled a performance at an interfaith service in Brooklyn, claiming the hosting synagogue had a “public alignment with pro-Israel political positions.” In San Francisco before the yearly Trans March, a Palestine group said in its announcement of its participation, “Stop the war on Iran and the genocide of Palestine, stop the war on immigrants and attacks on trans people.”
CAM notes that this “queers for Palestine” sentiment is not new, pointing to a 2017 event wherein “organizers of the Chicago Dyke March infamously removed participants who were waving a Pride flag adorned with a Star of David on the grounds that the symbol ‘made people feel unsafe.’”
In February, the Israel Defense Forces shared with the New York Post documents it had recovered demonstrating that Hamas had tortured and executed members it suspected of homosexuality and other moral offenses in conflict with Islamist ideology.
Amit Benjamin, who is gay and a first sergeant major in the IDF, said during a visit to New York City for Pride month that “All the ‘queers for Gaza’ need to open their eyes. Hamas kills gays … kills lesbians … queers cannot exist in Gaza.”
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IAEA pulls inspectors from Iran as standoff over access drags on
IAEA chief Rafael Grossi at the agency’s headquarters in Vienna, Austria, June 23, 2025. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl/File Photo
The UN nuclear watchdog said on Friday it had pulled its last remaining inspectors from Iran as a standoff over their return to the country’s nuclear facilities bombed by the United States and Israel deepens.
Israel launched its first military strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites in a 12-day war with the Islamic Republic three weeks ago. The International Atomic Energy Agency’s inspectors have not been able to inspect Iran’s facilities since then, even though IAEA chief Rafael Grossi has said that is his top priority.
Iran’s parliament has now passed a law to suspend cooperation with the IAEA until the safety of its nuclear facilities can be guaranteed. While the IAEA says Iran has not yet formally informed it of any suspension, it is unclear when the agency’s inspectors will be able to return to Iran.
“An IAEA team of inspectors today safely departed from Iran to return to the Agency headquarters in Vienna, after staying in Tehran throughout the recent military conflict,” the IAEA said on X.
Diplomats said the number of IAEA inspectors in Iran was reduced to a handful after the June 13 start of the war. Some have also expressed concern about the inspectors’ safety since the end of the conflict, given fierce criticism of the agency by Iranian officials and Iranian media.
Iran has accused the agency of effectively paving the way for the bombings by issuing a damning report on May 31 that led to a resolution by the IAEA’s 35-nation Board of Governors declaring Iran in breach of its non-proliferation obligations.
IAEA chief Rafael Grossi has said he stands by the report. He has denied it provided diplomatic cover for military action.
Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Thursday Iran remained committed to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
“[Grossi] reiterated the crucial importance of the IAEA discussing with Iran modalities for resuming its indispensable monitoring and verification activities in Iran as soon as possible,” the IAEA said.
The US and Israeli military strikes either destroyed or badly damaged Iran’s three uranium enrichment sites. But it was less clear what has happened to much of Iran’s nine tonnes of enriched uranium, especially the more than 400 kg enriched to up to 60% purity, a short step from weapons grade.
That is enough, if enriched further, for nine nuclear weapons, according to an IAEA yardstick. Iran says its aims are entirely peaceful, but Western powers say there is no civil justification for enriching to such a high level, and the IAEA says no country has done so without developing the atom bomb.
As a party to the NPT, Iran must account for its enriched uranium, which normally is closely monitored by the IAEA, the body that enforces the NPT and verifies countries’ declarations. But the bombing of Iran’s facilities has now muddied the waters.
“We cannot afford that … the inspection regime is interrupted,” Grossi told a press conference in Vienna last week.
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